The 802.11ba standard provides a WUR operation that allows a wireless access point (AP) to transmit a WUR packet to a client device when a main radio of the client device has data to receive. A client device that supports the 802.11ba standard has a secondary radio that generally consumes a relatively low amount of power and thus can remain active while the main radio is in an inactive state. When the secondary radio receives the wake-up packet from the AP, the secondary radio, in turn, sends a signal to trigger an active state in the main radio. This technique allows the client device to conserve power and latency, which addresses power consumption concerns for devices such as Internet-of-Things (IoT) devices. Particularly, IoT devices, while “always on,” do not typically require the main radio to be active unless wireless data is being sent to or from the device.
Typically, an AP that supports the 802.11ba standard generates the WUR packet using on-off keying (OOK) modulation, a scheme that represents data by the presence or absence of a carrier wave. Likewise, the secondary radio on a WUR-enabled client device recognizes a WUR packet based on the OOK modulation of the packet. However, an AP that implements 802.11 standards preceding ba are generally incapable of OOK modulation without significant modification to the underlying hardware of the AP. Therefore, 802.11 legacy APs may be unable to leverage WUR operations.
To facilitate understanding, identical reference numerals have been used, where possible, to designate identical elements that are common to the figures. Elements disclosed in one embodiment may be beneficially utilized on other embodiments without specific recitation.